[EM] Incumbent alternative vote IAV

[Kristofer Munsterhjelm]

Forest Simmons sent me a mail and asked me to forward it to the EM list 
with my reply. So here it is :-)

(Let's try that again, with the right From address this time.)

On 2024-10-01 19:47, Forest Simmons wrote:
> 
> 
> Warm greetings to both of you!
> 
> The current United States presidential election debacle begs for an 
> alternative like the following method:
> 
> 1. The incumbent party announces its pick for the next term of office 5 
> months before the election.
> 
> 2. The ballot lists all of the other candidates below this incumbent 
> Party candidate.
> 
> 3. Each voter marks the names of all candidates that she prefers over 
> incumbent Party candidate.
> 
> 4. If no candidate is marked on a full 50% Plus majority of the ballots, 
> then the incumbent party candidate wins the election.
> 
> 5. Otherwise the candidate that is marked on the most ballots i.e. to be 
> elected.
> 
> It seems to me that this method would have worked better than the de 
> facto two-party system has worked in the current election.
> 
> I wonder if you guys light forward this on to the election methods 
> mailing list and open it up for discussion.
> 
> In particular would it give an inappropriate advantage or disadvantage 
> to the incumbent party?
> 
> Would it exacerbate or remedy Duverger's Dilemma?
> 
> Wood voters find it harder or easier to work with than the so-called 
> Alternative Vote?
> 
> Thanks!

This seems to basically be Approval voting, just with a majority 
requirement that makes it harder to replace the incumbent.

As such, I would expect it to have most of the benefits and drawbacks of 
ordinary Approval voting - simplicity and FBC, but also the inherent 
jumbling together of "sincere" and "strategic" votes to the point that 
voters with non-dichotomous preferences pretty much have to think 
instrumentally.

The majority threshold would make "cooperating" in the Burr dilemma more 
likely for opposition candidates, because there's more of a risk that 
voting only for a subset of the opposition candidates could lead them 
all to lose.

So it would be less friendly to small parties than ordinary Approval, 
but probably more than ordinary FPTP.

-km